Nintendo DSi hands-on preview

I’ve seen the Nintendo DSi twice the past month. The first time was at a meeting with Nintendo representatives in early March and the second time is this video at the Game Developers Conference.

Since then, I’ve come away with a good feeling about what improvements the system officers. First off, for those wondering whether they should upgrade to the new hand-held, know that this system is not backward compatible with Nintendo GameBoy Advance titles. The Guitar Hero: On Tour obviously won’t be playable, but the company will still sell Nintendo DS Lite. They’re not going away anytime soon.

Nate Williams, of Nintendo Treehouse, sad, “We’re making the Nintendo DSi available for those who want a more interactive customizable experience that they want to share with friends.”

Physically, the new system has a bigger screen, a new power button and a better speakers with buttons instead of a slider to change volume. You can also hot swap games. Finally, you don’t have to shut down the system and restart the system if you want to switch games.
On the parent’s side, the parent control on the Nintendo DSi is stronger. Parents can set up the machines so they don’t play M-rated games. They can also limit what types of games players can download on the DSiWare store. There’s even an option to limit picture trading by turning the camera functionality off or on on the system.

Photos
* Photos are taken in the Nintendo DSi resolution. They will pop up as JPEGs.
* There’s a calendar that tracks when you take photos.
* You can send pictures to the Wii, your Mac. Williams said he says picture-sharing between DSi systems or social networks like Facebook.
* The photo software has 10 different lens that players can use before or after taking a photo. They include:
A distortion lens that makes your photo look like it’s taken in a funhouse mirror.
A graffiti lens that lets you write on a photo.
A color pad lens that lets you change or alter colors in a photo.
A mirror lens that makes you look like a cyclops. It’s a variation of a distortion lens.
A kaleidscopish lens.
A mischievous lens that lets you add mustaches or other things to a mug shot.
A motor lens that can bend facial expressions so that frowns can be flipped around to smiles, etc.
A combination lens that requires two people It lets you combine two faces. Think of Conan O’Brien’s if they mated segment.
A frame lens that lets you put photos in frames. You can also create your own frames as well. For example, you can get your face and use another photo as a frame. This lets you put your face on top of a picture of Brad Pitt if one were so inclined.

Music
* There’s a record and edit sound option. The sound bites can last for 10 seconds and you can record 18 of them. Think of it as a small soundboard.
* You can add your sound bites to an existing song on the Nintendo DS MP3 player.
* You can alter the sound bites so you can speed up a voice or slow it down. You can also lower and raise the pitch as well. You can also speed your own music or Podcasts as well.
* The Nintendo DSi accepts ACC files and M4A
* There’s different visualizations when you play music, including old old-school ones such as Super Mario Bros. and Excitebike. There are also little sound effects that you can add
* You can close the Nintendo DSi and still have it play in your pocket.
* You can take away the voice on certain tracks and just listen to the instrumental if you want.
* By changing the music, you never alter the integrity of the file. You can’t record your changes to the music.

DSiWare
* DSiWare has four different price structures. You can get software for free, 200 points, 500 points and 800-plus points.
* People will be able to buy point cards, but they won’t be able spread it around between both systems. They’ll be separate, not interchangeable.
* In the first six months of the launch, Nintendo will be offering 1,000 free points to customize or buy whatever games players want.
* WarioWare Snapped needs a background that provides enough contrast or it will have trouble reading your movements.